In 1783 Catherine the Great annexed the Crimea, prefacing a series of military ventures around the shores of the Black Sea to further Russia’s territorial ambitions.
On 27 March 184, the British Parliament was informed that ‘Her Majesty feels bound to afford active assistance to her ally the Sultan against unprovoked aggression’.
Fighting did not start at once. The first battles occurred in September 1954.
During the intervening 25 months, Britain combined with Turkey, France and Sardinia against Russia as both sides courted Austria and Prussia, which were hovering on the sidelines.
Russian with her powerful land armies had to move her forces slowly over poor roads or by river to the theaters of wars that the Allied powers could rapidly arrive at by sail or steam.
Britain and France been supporting Turkey, the declining Ottoman Empire, as a buffer against the more threatening and expanding Russian Empire.
Turkey’s decline was considered an opportunity for Russia to move in, even possibly taking Constantinople and threatening British and French control of Mediterranean.
In 1855, the tsars’ government ordered the main Russian Baltic battle fleet not to prepare for possible combat, as it was thought that they would be too heavily outnumbered and could not counter the allied technological edge.
Probably close to half million of the lives lost were Russian; civilian losses are unknown and a comparable number were Turkish. France probably lost 100,000, Britain perhaps 25,000 and Italy about 2,000. The war formally ended on 17 April 1856.
Crimean war (1854-1856)
